Proofs of God's existence

You are literally retarded, eternity is Not conceivable

>proof
God is experienced, not argued for.
>if a conception cannot be had then it is not possible
Solipsism.

>God is experienced, not argued for.
This. Westerner's are obsessed with being convincing and proving things. So to approach them with "religion" you have to tell them something like "yeah see, meditating on pratityasamutpada/Jesus doesn't get you a Ferrari, but it makes your brain release X and Y substance and feel really good".

Capitalism has made a market out of the whole planet pretty much. It's all this costs that, it's equivalent to this much, measures this, gets you this and so on. So an experience that is transcendental, which does away with opposition, which is not easily shareable and deeply individual or dependent on personal history, which shows no physical ramification, is hard to sell.

>Step 1: Assume God.
>Step 2: Therefore, God exists.

Same thing but one less step.

Today a young man on acid realized that all matter is merely energy condensed to a slow vibration, that we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively, there is no such thing as death, life is only a dream, and we are the imagination of ourselves. Heres Tom with the Weather.

Bill Hicks

You're on the right track. First premise is weak. It's could be that God is logically possible but not logically necessary.

Alternatively, replace the word God with any other concept, and now you can prove anything you want to exists.

The hilarious part is that maybe by the time you see evidence or are convinced, you may find that the true religion is syncretic/esoteric and you'll be missing your brains prime.
It deteriorates fast, mind you.

No that doesn't fly, because God has a bunch of unique conceptual properties that other concepts don't have. For instance, God's existence is (supposed to be) logically necessary because God is the wellspring of all creation. You can't say, for instance, that communism is either logically necessary or logically impossible.

More like Bill Hacks. Fucking hack.
Existence is logically necessary for omniscience.

Existence is logically necessary for any quality. That doesn't prove anything.

It's more necessary for omnipotence.

Proof doesn't exist.

>more necessary
good one

What if the Neanderthals actually worshiped the real God, but since Homo Sapiens eradicated them all before the invention of writing, we will never know. All this time we invented our own false gods, ignorant of the truth lost to prehistory.

Alternatively, what if in the scope of Homo Sapiens history, we never actually find the True God, but a million years later on some other planet, a different species of life evolves and discovers the True God who created them in his image, set apart from other lower forms of life such as humans on some distant planet they never discovered.

Boy wouldn't that be embarrassing, when you die you are wisked away through the galactic leyline to stand before an Alien God who says "Tough Luck Human, you were never part of my divine plan. In your primitive pattern recognition brainwaves, you assumed that gods must be like yourself."

Omnipotence requires existence even without existence.

What about Concept X, which has all the characteristics of the Concept of God.

I can prove that Concept X must exist, not god, or not an infinity of other things that I can assign characteristics to.

Not to mention, to cut through all the bullshit, suppose you argue for this logically necessary god, how does a religious person then take that thread all the way to all the anthropological specifics of a Religion?

>Concept X, which has all the characteristics of the Concept of God.
This is just Anselm's argument, a being-greater-than-which cannot be conceived.

>how does a religious person then take that thread all the way to all the anthropological specifics of a Religion?
Through the texts of their faith. That's why the Abrahamic religions are also called the "revealed" religions. Logical proofs for God's existence don't prove a particular religion is true.

Seems like they want to play both ways in this little "God" word game.
>See I proved "God" exists
>now allow me to peep into my hat and tell you what "God" wants you to do for me today

>they
That's a total strawman. Obviously there are some people who use religion for self-serving ends. That doesn't mean every debate about the existence of God is some kind of plot by mean old people to restrict your freedoms or whatever.

>1. False dichotomy
>2. False premise (i.e. conjecture)
>3. Non sequitur

If it's a "strawman" then why do you yourself literally agree with me in the very next thought that they do exactly what I said?

You thereby become the creator of God.

Technically anyone who agrees with the universe being infinite is agreeing with the existence of god since all possibilities must necessarily happen and not at the same time

It's a strawman because you don't say who "they" are and you're also making it sound like all religious people are "they"

Step 2 is ignorant of the possibility that, just because there currently isn't enough evidence to disprove God's existence, this evidence won't some day be discovered.

This entire claim doesn't disprove or prove anything. It's probably bait I guess.

Not him, but it pretty much applies to all the monotheistic religions.

If you are a genuine Deist i.e. someone that believes in the existence of a Creator God but doesn't make any claims about what that God 'thinks' or even believe 'it' doesn't actively interfere with Earthly affairs at all, then that is one thing.

However there's a massive disconnect between making an incredibly abstract argument for the existence of 'God' along the lines of Aquinas or Anselm and then moving to claiming to know what God thinks about marriage or sex or what you should eat or wear or what 'holy book' is true.

Works.

>Aquinas' four ways were refuted by Kant
Nice meme, you need to take in the whole Kantian schlong to think he refuted them.

>Omnipotence
Can he make a rock so big even he can't lift it?

If we look past your heretical, and anthropomorphic notion of God, yes.

But of course, the question demonstrates your lack of study in theology. This question was answered about 1000 years ago.

Remember when your kindergarten teacher told you there was no such thing as a stupid question?

She lied.

This is a really stupid question.

I think westerners are happy to buy into spiritual shit in a meditative/self improvement sense, it's why shit like a (usually misunderstood version of) Buddhism appeals to lots of Westerners. And it's why I think stuff like Stoicism is getting a bit of a revival as a philosophy.

Westerners have more trouble with the buy-in of having a God dictate laws to you on the premise of "just trust me". Like you said, if you sell it on what it does for the individual now, rather than what it does for the individual after he's dead (it's not easy to convince an empiricist of an afterlife), you're going to have more luck.

Stuff like Christianity is shit on so vehemently by westerners largely because it's an apocalyptic death cult. I don't say that derisively, I mean it's literally premised on "your life now isn't worth shit compared to what comes after, and the world's going to end eventually, maybe soon. And if you don't want to suffer horribly in that afterlife you need to TRUST ME when I tell you Jesus was the son of God and he died for your sins so you can be born again." To many people that comes off pretty poorly for pretty obvious reasons.

No. Omnipresent. He is the rock

ok, so can he make himself so big that even he can't force a change in himself?

>heretical
gentlemen, if I throw this switch, he enters his active state
>SOLA
>FIDAE

>God is experienced, not argued for
>Westerners ANYTHING

This "Westerner"-- whatever the fuck that means-- has done enough actual Zen that he knows what you're talking about, but that doesn't make it God.

He both can and cannot simultaneously, God is not limited to a single possibility.

Dr ian stevensons work on reincarnation, and past life regressions.

the knowledge of god is built into every human being.

does any of countless human religions describe this knowledge correctly, is a whole different ballgame.

>Aquinas' four ways were refuted by Kant
What are you talking about

Also see proofthatgodexists.org/

>Westerner's are obsessed with being convincing and proving things.

Not at all, its an Abrahamic thing you see heavily in Jews and Muslims as well. When a fairly controlling religious hierarchy is created based on them claiming to represent the divine who speaks to and through them questions are far more likley

What makes ideas real?

You can just google "omnipotence paradox" and read up on the various proposed answers on both sides of the debate by people smarter than Veeky Forums rather than thinking you're dropping a bomb with this shit. As far as theology is concerned its old hat.
Its been discussed. As far as Christian thought is concerned its been addressed.

This. Everyone instinctively knows God exists.

If I see that fucking deer one more time...

judaism is a western religion and partly where westerners get this obsession from in the first place

I can't even believe people can sincerely be atheist. Seems more rebellion knowing deep down some sort of God exist as opposed to a legitimate belief.

>Stuff like Christianity is shit on so vehemently by westerners largely because it's an apocalyptic death cult. I don't say that derisively, I mean it's literally premised on "your life now isn't worth shit compared to what comes after, and the world's going to end eventually, maybe soon. And if you don't want to suffer horribly in that afterlife you need to TRUST ME when I tell you Jesus was the son of God and he died for your sins so you can be born again."
This is open to interpretation. I don't view Christianity this way IMO. I see it as life affirming and Christ being an enlightened teacher who conquered life and death and offers salvation to those who accept him because it is God's will and his own (he manage to align his will perfectly with God).

It's capitalism and atheism, mate. The thing which opposed Christianity every step of the way.

That's money and it's easy to worship. It's like God, but not, like society.

>western religion
>from the east

>Like you said, if you sell it on what it does for the individual now, rather than what it does for the individual after he's dead
If everyone lived the way Jesus wanted us to the Earth would be a paradise.

People have come to realize our instinctive gut feelings aren't always right.

pic related doesn't discuss religion specifically but it discusses the myriad way we're fucking morons if we go with our instinct.

prove santa exists

>It's capitalism and atheism, mate. The thing which opposed Christianity every step of the way.

Is that why Jews, Christians and muslims were arguing over and writing extensive proofs of God 1800 years before capitalism and atheism became a thing?

You have a rather strange definition of western

Christianity is premised on an external otherworldly reward for your good behavior in this life. All I'm saying is that's a tough sell for empiricists who see no evidence of an afterlife.

Also people who practice according to doctrine in most Christian sects act in ways contrary to Christ's teachings anyway.

Saint Nicholas is a historical figure and Santa is as real or fake as anyone else's public persona.

Arguing theology has nothing to do with needing "tangible proof" for everything.

so why do people still celebrate christmas if he's not real

It's not for Santa. This is what happens when a society is culturally capitalist, not culturally Christian.

Yeah but Saint Nicholas is real.

Cool. Does not change the fact of what the book actually says. The same way the 10 commandments everyone follows are the first pair that was broken because it sounds better and ignores the second set entirely.

You can do that all you want, but don't be shocked when people who actually read the book disagree and wonder what the fuck you're talking about.

and so was jesus but how many people actually know that santa was based on saint nick

All of the ones I've seen are pretty shakey.

Probably not an unreasonably low number of people. Hopefully probably. Did you know the Dutch santa has a slave named Black Pete?

>Does not change the fact of what the book actually says
There was theological reasons involving St.Paul that Christians don't follow the 613 commandments, unlike the Jews.

Also the Bible is a compilation of books from spanning many different centuries. Its very fleshed out if you read the church Fathers why Christians generally do or don't believe what they do.

>but how many people actually know that santa was based on saint nick

He gets called saint nick all the fucking time.

Either way, the fact that normies don't have any idea what they're doing when it comes to holidays doesn't discredit the origin of said holidays.

I wasn't talking about all those commandments. I merely talked about the first 10 that Christians love to say applies, but seem to forget that the pair they cite was destroyed and replaced with a different set.

As for your second point, that means nothing. Ad hoc rationalizations, cherry picking of verses, etc., happened with those "church fathers" too. They are no less exempt from bias or having shitty reasoning.

See: taking a comeback about not washing hands as making all unclean foods clean (which they always have to add in parentheses because reading that otherwise you would never get that impression, and despite the fact that Jesus died kosher because if he wasn't there would have been no way for people to claim he was innocent since breaking that would have been a valid crime the Jews could bring up), Jesus all but saying he came to the children of Israel alone to the Canaanite woman and calling her a dog, etc.

A lot was changed simply to appeal to gentiles and nothing more. Making up all the excuses or interpretations in the world will not change very simple facts like what a book says or what it means.

But, if you knew all that, odds are you know that Yahweh as a god was once part of a pantheon and was never claimed to be all powerful or anything beyond leader of the heavenly army and weather and was only god of the Jews since he was their tribal god as each tribe had their own.

So, this fact alone invalidates the vast majority of Abrahamic faiths as bullshit regardless of their reasoning because they are talking about a very different god than Yahweh. They are two very different ideas about god and incompatible. Because if they are talking about Yahweh, they have to explain why all of the sudden no other gods exist and god is all powerful when Yahweh was part of a pantheon and not all powerful, and if they are speaking of a different god, I'd love to hear what god they do believe in and why they are taking stories from Yahweh and attributing them to this different god.

>A lot was changed simply to appeal to gentiles and nothing more.
You're under the mistake alot of people are. That Christianity is only an outgrowth of Judaism. This isn't nor was it ever the case. Christianity (like Judaism itself) is a composite of many different cultural ideas, spiritual views and religious traditions into a coherent doctrine. This include the Hebrew faith, Greek philosophy (Platonism especially) various indigenous European pagan practices, Zoroastrianism and others. This isn't "cherry picking," its the nature of how any religion comes about.

Saint Nick is honestly more common here than Santa, and I remember learning about the legend in elementary school alongside Christmas traditions of other European countries.

And to add , Christanity is only superfically "Jewish" but a closer inspection reveals this isn't the case. If you want to treat the complex issue of where many of Christianities doctrine stems from as "pandering to gentiles" you wouldn't be correct.

The main thrust of early Christianity was Jewish. These other influences only came in much later, and usually as a result of trying to prove god exists.

And secondly, they did pander to gentiles. Until Paul came along it was understood that Christianity was Jewish. All those rules and laws applied as they did to Jews, they were just Jews who believed the messiah had come. Paul, however, changed all of that, and pissed off a lot of early Christians until it lead to them getting more followers and power, thus saving the religion from extinction. Because Jews hated them as heretics, and Romans hated them as this crazy Jewish ascetic cult.

But early Christianity WAS Jewish and was only ever intended for Jews in Christ's own words to the Canaanite woman (making up shit excuses won't change that), but in order to survive they had to make concessions like giving up dietary laws, circumcision, and other things in order to become more palatable and accepted by Roman society and others. Those other influences came in because early Christianity made a metaphorical deal with the devil in order to survive, and that came at the expense of its Jewish roots.

>The main thrust of early Christianity was Jewish.
Not true. Christ taught something far different from the common pharisaism and sadducism, which was philosophically pleasing to something you'd find in Greece or Persia (or even Egypt).

>These other influences only came in much later,
Again, No. The Logos is a Greek concept, and found extensively in the Book of John.

>But early Christianity WAS Jewish and was only ever intended for Jews in Christ's own words to the Canaanite woman (making up shit excuses won't change that), but in order to survive they had to make concessions like giving up dietary laws, circumcision, and other things in order to become more palatable and accepted by Roman society and others. Those other influences came in because early Christianity made a metaphorical deal with the devil in order to survive, and that came at the expense of its Jewish roots.
That was for when Christ was alive. After his death it was always intended for the gentiles. Hence the passage "some Greeks go to visit Jesus" when he says the time for his passion has arrived.

So, them changing means nothing. Those influences came in to save themselves. Excuses were made to make the ideas more friendly to all rather than closed off to outsiders like Judaism was, rationalizations had to be made, ideas dropped or added in, etc. But it was clearly very well understood by said early Christians that this was a Jewish movement and meant for the Jews.

That went out the window later on, but because we don't live a few thousand years ago, we do have the knowledge to see all this, thus invalidating Christianity.

Believe what gets you through the day, but don't preach it as fact when your holy book does not agree with you, nor did Christ (if he existed), or the earliest Christians. There is a difference between you using it as a security blanket and being dishonest about the roots and contents of your faith to other people.

And to add to this, early Christanity had all its many communities among Galatians, Greeks and Macedonians for a reason. As did the gnostic sects which rose about at the same time.

Religions change you fucking idiot. It's not Jewish now.

Yeah, and compared it to a dog being thrown scraps from a dinner table. He threw a dog a bone, so to speak.

Jesus healed the Canaanite woman's daughter so that kind of defeats your point. He was just testing her, he didn't turn her away because she was a gentile, he even called her faith 'great'. What good is faith if his message was never intended for her? Why reward her for heeding a message he didn't even care whether she heeded or not?

I know it isn't Jewish now. And that is my point. That only further removes Christianity from the ideas of Yahweh and the god they claim to worship. So, if he is real, I'm pretty sure he is fucking pissed.

The non-Jewish "influences" are integral parts of Christian doctrine (like the logos) and were there from the begging. Including many of Christ own teachings.

It was never Jewish.

>a religion based around the man claiming to be the Jewish messiah is not Jewish

>the gospels written years after Christianity had been around having outside influences are proof that Jesus taught this

>people acting like the gospels were written at the moment Jesus said shit rather than fermenting for nearly 100 years of Christian history before anyone bothered to write it down

>a religion based around the man claiming to be the Jewish messiah is not Jewish
The idea of a messiah is not an exclusively Jewish concept en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messianism
>the gospels written years after Christianity had been around having outside influences are proof that Jesus taught this
if your not going to treat the gospels as being legitimate for discussion on the nature of Christian doctrine as intended your arguing bad faith.

>people acting like the gospels were written at the moment Jesus said shit rather than fermenting for nearly 100 years of Christian history before anyone bothered to write it down
See above.

Christians don't worship Yahweh, Yahweh is the god of the Israelites and is a one-person God.

The God of mankind is a three-person God, and His relatipnship to humanity is not a covenant with the Israelites, but rather something much more profound.

I'm not an expert on ancient religions, was there ever an instance of a god sacrificing something to humanity before Christianity?

Even if I weren't Christian and only read the Bible as literature, that is genius.
He was Jewish, but not a messiah for the Jews alone.

The Biblical messiah IS based on the Jewish faith. Secondly, every gospel besides John, the most recent gospel written after Christianity tried to appeal to gentiles has that. The earlier ones have none of that.

>The Biblical messiah IS based on the Jewish faith
Not something so clear cut as you think. Why do you think the magi visited Christ? Your problem is you see it through a modern lens.

If that is true, then why do Christians even have the old testament if their god is not Yahweh? Why did Jesus cite said prophets of Yahweh? Why is supposed prophecy of the Jewish messiah given to prophets of Yahweh applied to Jesus if he has no relation to said god?

The idea of a messiah figure transcends faiths. As do a lot of Christ's teachings and actions.

We don't know who those three wise men were. So, we can't say.

You see through a modern lens based on modern understandings of Christianity, which is entirely foreign and disconnected from the actual origins of the faith. And it took several hundred years and formation by committee before any canon was even in place and even more hundreds of years before all the people who disagreed got put down by force for being heretics. Only then did you get the Christianity you have today. It is very different than early Christianity.